


shut your eyes, trust in me

by abovetheruins



Category: Rise of the Guardians (2012)
Genre: Child Abuse, Dark, M/M, Minor Character Death, Non-Graphic Violence
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-12-27
Updated: 2012-12-27
Packaged: 2017-11-22 14:55:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,319
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/611059
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/abovetheruins/pseuds/abovetheruins
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Jack delivers his own brand of justice. Fill for the ROTG kink meme.</p>
            </blockquote>





	shut your eyes, trust in me

He didn't mean to do it, the first time.

Wouldn't have done it at all, if the opportunity hadn't fallen into his lap the way it had. 

He just wanted to protect the kids. Even if they didn't see him, didn't believe in him, he couldn't let one of them suffer without doing _something_ , anything in his power to stop it. 

He'd happened upon her by accident, hopping from rooftop to rooftop one winter night, spreading his frost wherever he went. He'd landed on her windowsill by chance, admiring the thick layer of frost he'd spread over the sleepy little town. He hadn't expected the window to open, the latch giving way under tiny, pale hands, and he'd hovered in the air a moment as he took in what - and who - lay inside the darkened room. 

Her name was Margaret. He'd seen her in town with the other kids a few times, a pale, quiet thing following blindly after the older children. She couldn't be more than ten years old, with dark curls and sad blue eyes. There was a ragged teddy bear tucked underneath her arm, fur torn and One of its eyes had come loose, dangling forlornly against its furry cheek.  
She held it close, staring out at the dark night sky, and Jack knew with a strange sense of foreboding that something wasn't right. 

She was staring straight at him - straight _through_ him, anyway - and when Jack drifted a little closer he could see with a spike of alarm that her shoulders were shaking. 

"Hey," he said, voice soft. It was pointless, he knew. She couldn't hear him. Still, a part of him hoped that somehow, some way, she'd be able to sense a friendly presence. "What's wrong, little one? It's a little chilly out here, you know." He twirled his staff through the air, creating a burst of snowflakes. Margaret's eyes widened at the flurry. She stuck her tiny face further out over the windowsill and reached out to catch the flakes, laughing joyously as they caught on her fingers. Jack grinned at the sight, relief coursing through him. Maybe she couldn't see him, but he had still been able to do something to cheer her up. He was about to call forth another burst when a trickle of moonlight snuck through the clouds up above, chasing away the shadows that had been clinging to Margaret's face and the darkness of her room beyond.

Jack froze. A bruise marred the side of Margaret's face, stretching purple and swollen across her left cheek. He could see the impression of fingers. A handprint. 

"Who... who did that to you?" The words were barely whispered, released into the air in a gust of white. Jack's insides felt squirmy and hot, nauseous in a way he hadn't felt since the first time someone had walked right though him.

"What are you doing up there?!" 

Both Jack and Margaret jumped at the voice, loud and angry, followed soon after by the thump of feet on the floorboards outside her room. Margaret slapped her hands over her mouth, eyes losing what bit of light they'd had, giggles vanquished under an onset of panic and fear that had Jack's stomach dropping.

The door had barely opened before Margaret was crying, trying to stifle it in her hands and failing, hiccuping out a strangled, "P-papa! I'm sorry, I didn't mean to - " and breaking off into a pained, choked yelp as her father grabbed her by the arm, hauling her backwards into the depths of her room, away from the window.

Jack watched in silent agony, not knowing what to do. Frost sparked off the curve of his staff in restless bursts, dropping the temperature around him by degree after degree. He could freeze him, could cover the floor with ice and slip him up like he did everyday to countless other hapless adults, but his hands were shaking so badly, there was a rushing in his ears that was making it hard to think, and then, in that heartbeat of hesitance, Margaret's father was gone, slamming her bedroom door so forcefully it shook the walls.

She lay where he'd thrown her, another dark bruise mottling her arm where he'd grabbed her. Her face was tear-streaked and paler than before, face buried into her pillow to keep her cries muffled. Her teddy bear was gone.

In a burst of wind, Jack disappeared from her window.

-

In the end, it wasn't difficult. That, above all else, scared Jack more than anything. He didn't even think, didn't _let_ himself think. The only thing he allowed himself to focus on was the memory of Margaret's tear-stained face, the bruises on her skin, the terror and panic in her eyes. 

He chose his pond out of familiarity and lack of time more than anything else. He wouldn't allow himself to wait, not when that meant leaving Margaret at risk. 

When her father left the house the next evening, Jack followed him. Followed him through town, through the newly fallen blanket of snow Jack had conjured that morning, until they reached the local pub. 

There was white noise inside his head as he waited, eyes following the man as he downed mug after mug of frothy liquid. Be barely paid attention to any conversations that were taking place, hands turning his staff over and over, restless fingers digging into the icy wood. 

There was something simmering just below his skin, something like nausea and anxiety and a gaping, monstrous well of _fear_. What he was about to do... It was the right thing, wasn't it? He was protecting a child. What else could he do, turn away from her? Let her suffer?

No. No, this was the right thing. 

Jack swallowed against another lump of fear.

It had to be. 

-

In the end, a few well placed tracks of ice was all it took. The man was too full of drink to even begin to pull himself upright from the frozen surface of Jack's pond, thick fingers scrabbling at the surface to no avail.

Jack stood over him, hood pulled down low over his eyes, hand clenching around his staff. Margaret's father was terrified. Even in his drunken haze he could sense the danger hanging like a suffocating quilt around him, even if he couldn't see or understand where it was coming from. Jack shut his eyes.

_Don't think_ , he chanted, knuckles white as his grip tightened to near painful levels. _Don't think, don't think! Just do it, Jack!_. The buzzing in his head reached a cresendo. 

He raised his staff in one jerk of his hand and struck it against the ice. There was the thick, loud crack of fractures out over the pond, breaking the once pristine sheet of ice into pieces. Jack heard a shout, a splash, the weak thrash of a body fighting against the pull of icy water, and then -

Silence.

Jack carefully cracked open one eye and then the other. He stared at the hole in the ice, the slightly stirring water. The buzzing in ears finally came to a blissful, grinding halt.

He fell to his knees, breath rushing past his lips in a sudden, painful gush. His staff clattered noisily to the side. Sobs wracked his thin shoulders, so loud and sudden he couldn't move from the force of them, eyes staring unseeing and horrified into the inky black water. Within moments even the ripples had ceased, leaving the water undisturbed once again, as though nothing had happened.

_It was the right thing to do_ , he thought, gulping in great lungfuls of frigid air. _I didn't do anything wrong! I didn't..._

Wrapped in his thoughts, lost in the tumult going on inside his head, he missed the dark presence watching him silently from across the lake, the piercing golden eyes that studied him thoughtfully. In the next instance, they were gone.


End file.
